Chapter 4 _ Evelyn

(Three weeks later)

For the first time in my adult life, my phone was powered down and shoved into the deepest corner of my underwear drawer, buried beneath the lace and silk I used to wear for him. I didn't want to see it. I didn't want to see the notifications lighting up the screen like tiny explosions of pity and gossip.

I spent days off social media for my mental health. I couldn't bear to scroll through I*******m and see the curated perfection of other people's lives while mine was burning to ash. But mostly, I couldn't bear to see them.

The Saturday of the wedding came and went.

I didn't leave Stella’s guest room that day. I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling fan slicing through the heavy, humid air, counting the rotations. One, two, three.

Even with my phone off, I knew. The city of London is loud, but the silence in my heart was louder. I knew the exact moment the vows were being exchanged. I could feel the shift in the atmosphere. It was the talk of the city, perhaps even the country. The union of Jason Sterling and the Oil Minister’s daughter. It was the kind of wedding that stopped traffic, the kind that was splashed across every major blog and newspaper.

"A Royal Union," they probably called it.

"The Wedding of the Decade."

And I, the woman who had ironed the groom’s shirts for eight years, the woman who had nursed him through fevers and failures, was just a footnote and a ghost.

So, this is true. Another woman has taken my place. She is wearing the ring that was paid for with the money Jason and I worked for. She is dancing the first dance to the song we chose. She has taken my eight-year boyfriend—no, my eight-year life partner—and turned him into her husband in the span of forty-eight hours.

Depression wasn't just a feeling; it became my second name.

It sat on my chest like a physical weight, heavy and suffocating. It tasted like metal in my mouth. For the first two weeks, I didn't shower unless Stella forced me. I didn't eat unless she put the spoon to my lips. I felt like I was mourning a death, but it was worse than death. In death, there is closure. In this, there was only the knowledge that he was alive, breathing, and happy—without me.

I would wake up in the middle of the night, reaching for him, only to grab a handful of cold sheets. The realization would hit me anew, fresh and sharp as a blade: He is married. He is on his honeymoon.

He is probably in the Maldives, or Paris, or Santorini—places we planned to go together. He is sipping champagne and looking into her eyes with that intensity I thought was reserved for me. He is enjoying the best moment of his life, while I am here, rotting in a guest bedroom, wondering where I went wrong.

But by the third week, something snapped.

I walked past the mirror in the hallway and caught a glimpse of myself. My hair was matted, my eyes were sunken with dark circles that looked like bruises, and my collarbones were protruding sharply. I looked like a victim.

"No," I whispered to the empty hallway.

I looked pathetic and if there was one thing Jason Sterling would love now is my weakness. If he could see me now, he wouldn't feel guilt; he would feel vindicated. He would look at this broken shell of a woman and think, 'I made the right choice.'

"I have to do better," I told my reflection, my voice raspy from disuse. "I have to move on."

I couldn't let him win. I couldn't let him destroy me completely. I had to prove—if not to him, then to myself—that I wasn't just 'Jason's ex-girlfriend.' I was Evelyn. I was a person before him, and I had to be a person after him.

So, gradually, painfully, I started picking my broken pieces together.

It started small. I turned my phone back on. I blocked his number immediately—not that he would call, but to protect myself from the hope that he might. I blocked his friends. I blocked the blogs. I curated my world to be a Jason-free zone.

I started going out. Just to the grocery store at first, then to a café to read. Just to free my mind. It was helping, but it wasn't helping. I would see a car that looked like his and freeze. I would smell a cologne that smelled like his Oud Wood and feel the nausea rise in my throat.

But I got used to it. Eventually, Jason was leaving the forefront of my mind and settling into the background, like a dull ache you learn to live with, like a bad knee when it rains. I got busy with life. I started looking for a new apartment. I dusted off my CV. I reconnected with friends who I had neglected because I was too busy playing 'perfect wife' to a boyfriend.

Now, I can say I have moved on or at least, I was going through the motions convincingly enough.

It’s been one month already.

One month since the restaurant. One month since the drama. One month since my life imploded.

I should be feeling better. I should be feeling the rush of independence. But instead, I’ve been feeling very tired.

Not just tired—exhausted. A bone-deep weariness that sleep couldn't fix. I would wake up after ten hours of sleep and feel like I had run a marathon and the sleepiness... It was overwhelming. I was falling asleep at odd times. I dozed off in the cab. I dozed off while waiting for my coffee.

I just blamed it on my condition. It’s trauma, I told myself. It’s the emotional hangover. At least, that’s what the articles online said. Post-traumatic stress can manifest as physical fatigue.

"It's normal," Stella assured me over dinner one night, watching me push my jollof rice around the plate. "You’re trying to move on from an eight-year failed relationship, Eve. Your body is just processing the shock. Give it time."

But then came the feverish feeling. The hot flashes. The way the smell of frying onions made my stomach turn violently.

"It could be malaria," I thought.

Living in London, malaria is always the first suspect. The fatigue, the slight rise in temperature, the loss of appetite. It fits the profile perfectly. I probably hadn't been using mosquito repellent while I was wallowing in my depression hole.

"I need to get checked," I decided. I couldn't afford to be sick on top of being heartbroken. I needed to be strong.

I went to the hospital on a Tuesday morning—ironically, exactly four weeks to the day of the breakup.

The hospital was busy, filled with the sharp scent of antiseptic and the low murmur of patients. I sat in the waiting room, clutching my handbag, feeling small. I hated hospitals. They reminded me of the times I had been here before. The six times.

The memories threatened to surface—the cold stirrups, the white ceiling, Jason holding my hand and whispering, 'Not now, babe. Soon. Next time.'—but I pushed them down. I wasn't here for that. I was here for malaria drugs.

"Miss Evelyn?" a nurse called out.

I went in. They took my blood pressure (low), checked my temperature (normal, which was weird), and drew a few vials of blood.

"We’ll run a full panel," the doctor said. He was a kind, older man with glasses perched on the end of his nose. "Just to be sure. Check for malaria, typhoid, the usual."

I nodded, grateful. "Thank you, Doctor. I just feel... drained."

"We'll have the results in an hour. Wait in the reception."

The hour dragged on. I sat there, scrolling mindlessly through my phone, avoiding I*******m, just reading news about the country. Anything to keep my brain from wandering to the fact that Jason was probably back from his honeymoon now, settling into his new mansion with his new wife.

Finally, the nurse beckoned me back in.

I walked into the doctor's office, expecting a prescription for anti-malaria tablets and maybe some vitamins.

But the doctor wasn't writing on his pad. He was holding my file, and he was smiling.

A big, beaming smile.

"Congratulations, Miss Evelyn," he said, his voice booming in the small office.

I froze halfway to the chair. "I... I beg your pardon?"

"You don't have malaria," he said, chuckling as if we were sharing a delightful joke. "And you don't have typhoid."

He turned the paper towards me. I stared at the numbers and words, but they swam before my eyes.

"Your HCG levels are quite high," he explained, tapping the paper. "Congratulations, my dear. You are pregnant."

The world stopped spinning and the office suddenly felt suffocating and hot.

I stared at him, my mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.

"Pregnant?" I whispered. The word felt foreign, clumsy on my tongue.

"Yes," he nodded enthusiastically. "About five weeks along, I'd estimate. We’ll need to do an ultrasound to be sure of the dating, but there is no mistake with the blood work."

Five weeks.

My mind raced backward, doing the math with trembling speed. Five weeks ago. That was... that was the week before the anniversary. That was the week we went to that charity gala. The night we came home tipsy and laughing, and he had made love to me with a passion that felt so real, so permanent.

I sat down heavily in the chair, my legs giving out.

"This... this can't be right," I stammered. "Doctor, are you sure?"

"I am very sure," he smiled, misinterpreting my shock for happy disbelief. "It's a blessing."

A blessing.

I felt a hysterical laugh bubbling up in my throat, threatening to turn into a scream.

Jason left me because he wasn't sure if I still had a womb. He left me because he said he didn't know if I could give him children—after he was the one who made me terminate them for his career. He broke me, discarded me, and married another woman to start a family.

And now?

Now, I was sitting in a cold doctor's office, carrying the very thing he said he wanted.

I was pregnant with Jason Sterling's child. The child of a married man. The child of the man who paid me ten thousand dollars to disappear.

I looked down at my flat stomach, my hands shaking uncontrollably.

Nothing in my life had prepared me for this. I thought I was moving on. I thought I was free. But as the doctor’s words settled over me like a heavy shroud, I realized the cruelest joke of all.

I wasn't just his ex-girlfriend anymore. I was the mother of his heir.